Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas Judge
Steven O'Neill said the 79-year-old comedian would be tried
again beginning on Nov. 6. He is accused of the sexual assault
of Temple University administrator Andrea Constand in his
Philadelphia-area home in 2004.
Cosby built a long career on a family-friendly style of comedy
exemplified by the 1980s TV hit "The Cosby Show" before dozens
of women came forward to accuse him of sex assault in a series
of incidents dating back to the 1960s.
The vast majority of those alleged incidents were too old to be
the subject of criminal prosecution, but Cosby has faced one
criminal trial because prosecutors in Pennsylvania charged him
in December 2015, just days before the statute of limitations
was to run out on Constand's claim.
The jurors who heard Cosby's first trial in Norristown,
Pennsylvania, who were bused in from Pittsburgh, 300 miles (480
km) away, failed to reach a unanimous verdict last month after
52 hours of deliberations that often stretched late into the
night.
Cosby has long denied any criminal wrongdoing and has said that
any sexual contact he had with his accusers was consensual. His
spokesman, Andrew Wyatt, hailed the hung-jury outcome as a
victory for Cosby, who has not performed to a paying audience
for more than two years.
Cosby is also awaiting two trials over civil lawsuits filed
against him by accusers, with both scheduled for the summer of
2018.
(Reporting by Scott Malone in Boston; Editing by Peter Cooney)
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